The only problem with that is your online component becomes pretty much useless after the first few weeks. If someone decides 2 months after release that they want to try the game out who’s gonna be playing the online demo version? There needs to be a more permanent way to allow people to experience online in a demo if it’s going to be included.
if its free, there will always be demoers. Trust me on this one.
That’s part of the problem!
how is this a problem? if they dont ever buy the game, well tough luck. Not many people are only going to play the demo forever. If they dont do anything other than play the demo, they were never going to buy it in the first place. What I was referring to is, because it is free, people will just be downloading the trial just to have something to play. And because it has online, they wont be bored for like an hour.
I REALLY don’t think this is true. There will be people who would buy the game but don’t because they can subsist off the demo. Anything that can be abused will be abused. It’s just a matter of if it’s more beneficial to have the online demo than not, which I can’t determine.
Its a $15/20 game. How cheap a person can be to play only a demo of a game they like?
trust me. There are people this cheap.
your probably right…but in that case, there should be no online. Just vs. with 3 characters. as a matter of fact, when I think about it, the best fighting game demo I ever played was the mvc2 demo. Me and my friends would sit there and play with those same 6 characters for like hours. and because we had so much fun playing it, I went ahead and bought the game immediately.
What would you include online in the demo for?
- People new to FGs don’t really need it as they’re more interested in how the game looks and that it’s fun to play against CPU. Actually I’d say an online function would rather push them away from buying it, as they’d get mindlessly bodied every game.
- People with FG experience know where to look for posts regarding how good/bad the online is playable, plus know what GGPO is, plus bitch at how online isn’t the real game and that they’d rather iron their hands anyways.
I’d include:
- 3 Character archetypes (e.g. Filia/Cerbella/Peacock)
- Half of the arcade mode, free to choose whether 1-2-3 characters
- Versus mode vs other people (no CPU), heavily limited (eg: only 1character-teams, 1 round, 60 seconds)
- Slightly less than half of the Tutorial
This gives:
a) A very general outlook on how the game plays with any team size
b) An appetizer on the fun you could have with your friends
c) An idea of how easy this game is to pick up and what you are going to learn
Sidenote: I really hope there is a lot of work put into the tutorial. In the extreme case that people asking for help on FG X in the Newbie Saikyo Dojo would get directed to “Buy Skullgirls, its 15$ and it got a tutorial that teaches you all the fundamentals you have to know”, it would not only SG and its community a whole lot of good, but the FG community as a whole would severely benefit.
That’s part of the reason why I’d include a good bit of the tutorial into the demo - if the tutorial is as good as it’s made out to be, word will spread that anyone interested in picking up any FG should download the SkullGirls demo and do those first trials. And there are bound to be some people that’ll end up saying “Man, this game looks awesome”.
but isnt the option to pick how many characters you have on your team a major feature of the game?
other than that, i agree with you, I have changed my mind and now I don’t think it would be a good idea to have online in the demo.
Yes, being able to pick your team size is a major feature of the game. That’s why I suggested it to be possible in Arcade.
For Versus, I’d specifically not allow it, to force people to pay. They can see how it plays out in the Arcade Mode,
but to have fun with it while playing with their friends (be it offline or online), they have to pay. Simple as that.
Nope I didn’t lol
So are they releasing a demo or not?
Yes. It’s required by Microsoft for downloadable games. PS3 is getting one as well. It is being released the same day as the full release.
Hmm cool I guess? Not that it matters to me as the full game will already be on the HDD by then.
Still waiting for DAT STEAM version for even better online.
Instead of having a time-locked demo, make it where it includes online play but that the online play alone will be disabled a month after release or something.
Burnout Paradise did this by having a demo out before the game’s release that allowed you to play online for quite a while, but then when the game came out, online - and online alone - was disabled. You could still play by yourself, but if you wanted to go online, you had to pony up that cash.
Or, ya know, just let them play online with the demo regardless. Is there any time limit for playing the demo of KOFXIII online? I don’t remember hearing about one, but I haven’t tried it seeing as I already have the game. Seriously, I don’t see why anyone would think that anybody who loves the demo of Skullgirls would be content with just the demo - especially if the price is right for the full game.
I like Vulpes idea for features , though I would have a little less than half of the tutorial. This all depends, of course, on how long said tutorial is.
I am here: http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=41.719628,-71.479113
Might as well throw my 2 pence in.
First off, there are pros and cons to having online in the demo, the major con being that ne people getting pwned might turn them off, obvious pro is that they can see how good the netcode is. I think this pro actually wins.
Anyway, ideas for what might be nice and enticing:
Demo has arcade, vs (on and offline), tutorial and practice modes. All are limited:
All modes have only access to 3 characters out of 5 possible, randomly chosen each day, for example Cerebella, Peacock, Ms Fortune, Painwheel and Parasoul are the pool, and each day you play the demo, it will randomly choose 3 that you have access to, but you can still fight against the others in Arcade mode and online.
Arcade mode only gets up to the sub-boss if they are in this game, then ends before the match starts.
VS mode only lets you use the 3 random characters (still let’s you choose team size, assists, etc.), online only lets you play 7 (?) matches a day, but you can play against people with the full version. Maybe include a toggle for people with the full version to allow demo players or not, default to allow.
Tutorial mode is incomplete, but covers the basics to help newbies out.
Practice mode is limited to one player, no attack data.
This might sound convoluted, but to the end user, it is quite simple “I can’t use all the characters”, but then when the demo ends a message along the lines of “come back tomorrow for a chance to use some new characters” comes up, and gives them a reason to play it again, and get more hooked. As for people only using the demo and not buying the game, they will get limited online play and even VS will be fun, but limited. If someone is demoing and finds painwheel to be their favourite character, there is no guarantee that they will get to use her at all on any given day or if they like a team of Cere, PW and Para, chances of being able to use that online become quite small and then only for 7 matches anyway.
Finally, there will always be 3 characters that no matter what, they can’t use unless they buy the game.
As an aside, if the character limited demo is the way things are going, I don’t think Cerebella AND Fillia should be part of the selection, purely because they both have the mad living headgear thing going on, and to some people, that could give a very limited view of the art style and characters.
Who cares about the demo! I already played this at EVO last year so I know its INSTA BUY!!! 
Lol. The people who didn’t play it at EVO last year? There are still quite a few.
As of now I still think Vulpes has the best idea for the tutorial (which I imagine is pretty close to done as well at this point?) Looking through the ideas you presented it seems IMHO you’re giving away too much, especially with the online. I dunno. I think its an extremely thin and dangerous line when it comes to deciding what to give away for online. My concern continues to be that Reverge and Autumn need to see a return to continue on making more content for the game and hopefully releasing a sequel down the line. I wouldn’t give access to that many characters personally, even on a random basis. The first three control differently enough that it should be a good indicator of the kind of gameplay to expect. I would maybe allow to play against extra characters so that the player knows what they are missing, but I would still leave some of them unselectable/unplayable. That should hopefully give enough incentive to someone who likes the game to pick up the full version.
This is the only fighting game in recent history that has had a tight veil of secrecy wrapped around its release date…so weird…I hope this gem gets released soon…I look forward to’a darkstalkers/vs mash up 
SG is gonna have some stiff competition if it’s released March :l
Because everyone will be spazzing out over SFxT (which I am gladly skipping to get Skullgirls :3 ) and some other games.
Hopefully we can get an exact date this March (unless they decide to release it this end of the month which seems unlikely.)